The Orthodoxy of Those Days.
THE “orthodox” view concerning the law of God, and the reverence in which it was held by the church people of a hundred years ago, is quite clearly set forth in the paragraph that follows, quoted from Dr. Adam Clarke’s comments on Rom. 7:7: “It is not likely that a dark, corrupt, human heart can discern the will of God. His law is His will: it recommends what is just, and right, and good, and forbids what is improper, unjust, and injurious. If God had not revealed Himself by this law, we should have done precisely what many nations of the earth have done, who have not had this revelation; put darkness for light, and sin for acts of holiness. While the human heart is its own measure, it will rate its workings according to its own propensities; for itself is its highest rule. But when God gives a true insight of His own perfections, to be applied as a rule, both of passion and practise, then sin is discovered; and discovered, too, to be exceedingly sinful. So, strong propensities, because they appear to be inherent in our nature, would have passed for natural and necessary operations; and their sinfulness would not have been discovered if the law had not said, Thou shalt not covet, and thus determined that the propensity itself, as well as its outward operations, is sinful. The law is the straight edge which determines the quantum of obliquity in the crooked line to which it is applied.” Such views as the foregoing concerning the law of God, held by the stalwart Christians of Doctor Clarke’s time, gave England her great stability of government, implanted strength and stability in Holland and Germany, and the sons and daughters of those sturdy supporters of the highest law migrated to this country and established one of the greatest and most desirable nations that has ever blessed the face of this earth. Men do not respect the law of God so highly nor teach it so strongly as they once did, and the lawlessness and corruption of the time is the result. When the supreme law, the law of Jehovah, is lightly esteemed, the sure result of the disregard for human law must follow.